simple Hi-Tek coating

[Ausglock]

And the lack of popularity is because?
these bullets are shorter without grooves to maintain the 125gn weight.
Now we are getting to the question I did not ask, but inferred. Is removing the lube grove a good or a bad thing?
My personal opinion is its a good thing. However that is based on speculative thinking.
All new RN molds are grooveless
For example no LG allows for more sealing surface and more engagement with the riffling. Also being a gain or two heavier should in theory have a positive effect on "bullet drop" over pistol distances, however minor.

Smoothbore molds are also easier to handcast from, this I know is factual.
Also , should grooveless molds not be cheaper?, the cherries cost less to manufacture, the design is simpler, so making the molds would be slightly less complicated?
Nobody making machine caster molds uses a Cherry any longer. they are all CNC cut.
I know this is not about coating itself, but it has a direct connection to coating. Are we hanging on the the throwback grove for nostalgia sake, or is there a performance reason to retain something, that now is no longer nessesary?
the 125gn Conical is the only groove bullet we make. all the rest are groovless.
PS I ran out of weed 45 years ago.

Good... you QLDers are stupid enough without it.

[Stephen Cohen]

Good... you QLDers are stupid enough without it.

You crack me up. I can't find fault with your observations especially the last one, old age is hard enough without trying to keep the bong alight. Regards Stephen

[Tazza]

This got me wondering if Grooves were really that big a deal. Ergo I poked Trevor, and, as predicted he fired up as all them funny NSW guys do..
I dunno, I just like the smooth profile of a lube grooveless projectile. Has anyone had a pill that stopped performing after having the groove removed? I can only ask to find out.

I'd love to test this too, i have such a mould, a 125 con that i have two peeps that have had tumbling issues with them, but none with 125rn, the mould is flogged out, so i have no issue potentially sending it to the recycle bucket if i mess it up when removing the grooves. Still trying to figure a way to do it and keep the BB, i was thinking of a 9mm carbide round nose end mill and come in from the open half and just touch the bump and take it off. but i bet that the round nose end mill will not be a nice round nose that will match the contour of the cavity. The other way was to get a 9mm end mill in HSS and cut a groove in it so it will clear the BB area and cut the lump for the groove out. I figure if i slightly under cut this, when the hi-tek goes on, it will fill up this slight dent and when sizing, it will leave it silky smooth (good in theory hey?)

[Vettepilot]

I trashed my 9mm Lee tumble lube mold trying to mill it out. One of these days I will try to salvage it by milling it out to make conical boolits for my 1858 Remington .44 black powder revolver.

Meanwhile, for 9mm, I just bought another Lee mold in the non-tumble lube type.

Vettepilot

[Stephen Cohen]

Tazza one of the moulds I removed the grooves from I did with a Dremel and burr, it was slow and difficult being a steel mould, the result was great after I lapped it and removed all minor marks. This was a gas check mould so it presented the same problem you face with retaining the bevel base. I have seen others done this way that looked a bit rough but after sizing all is good. Regards Stephen

[Ausglock]

Tazza.
A 23/64ths ballnose endmill will work. not cheap, but does a great job.
Just set the half up and coat the cavity with layout spray to see where you are going.
Real steady on the feed and make sure you zero out the axis' with a dial indicator to ensure the cavity is parallel. cavity... not the mold block.

[Tazza]

Tazza.
A 23/64ths ballnose endmill will work. not cheap, but does a great job.
Just set the half up and coat the cavity with layout spray to see where you are going.
Real steady on the feed and make sure you zero out the axis' with a dial indicator to ensure the cavity is parallel. cavity... not the mold block.

Thanks for the tip, i'll see what i can find and see if i can not mess it up too badly, i really don't trust my eyes enough to do as Stephen advised with a dremel, i know i''d make a big 'ol mess. Sadly i don't have a dial indicator to line it all up with, so it may be zeroed with marking compound as you said, i can use the lube groove as the marking point, so if i scratch it, i't snot a big deal.

hopefully i'll get to this in the not too distant future, i have so many things on the go now, it's silly...

[Stephen Cohen]

I'd love to test this too, i have such a mould, a 125 con that i have two peeps that have had tumbling issues with them, but none with 125rn, the mould is flogged out, so i have no issue potentially sending it to the recycle bucket if i mess it up when removing the grooves. Still trying to figure a way to do it and keep the BB, i was thinking of a 9mm carbide round nose end mill and come in from the open half and just touch the bump and take it off. but i bet that the round nose end mill will not be a nice round nose that will match the contour of the cavity. The other way was to get a 9mm end mill in HSS and cut a groove in it so it will clear the BB area and cut the lump for the groove out. I figure if i slightly under cut this, when the hi-tek goes on, it will fill up this slight dent and when sizing, it will leave it silky smooth (good in theory hey?)

Your idea about relieving the endmill so it does not come in contact with bevel base is similar to how I lapped my mould after the Dremel work. I used a brass rod as a lap and it was relieved so it did not come in contact with the gas check shank. Regards Stephen

[Petander]

TMG Gold and superhard .500 bullets.

[Tazza]

Thanks for the details Stephen, when i get some time and find a suitable end mill, i'll give it a go. Seems that 23/64 end mills aren't easy to get locally..... I don't have enough to order from travers to make it worth while. Shame drill bits aren't very good at side cutting, i have those in that size, cut it down so it doesn't wobble as much.

That is some hard looking lead right there, the grain looks awesome.

[Stephen Cohen]

TMG Gold and superhard .500 bullets.

Man that is hard, how did the hammer stand up. Regards Stephen

[Ausglock]

I have been asked what motor and gearbox I run on the Sizer I built. So here is the data plates.

[Jatz357]

I have been asked what motor and gearbox I run on the Sizer I built. So here is the data plates.

If I read the worm drive plate correctly the ratio is 25:1?

I’ve made a couple of sizers with different feed mechanisms and have used a 3 phase motor with a VFD and used 10:1 worm drive. They work well but a 15:1 drive would help with tighter projectiles. Both run well at around 85 - 90 strokes a minute. The last one I built will run at 144 a minute but don’t know how long it would last at that speed. One sizer has probably sized about 600000 so far and going strong.

[Ausglock]

yep 25 to 1.
This does 1 per second with plenty of power for sizing.
I'm going to build a slightly bigger one similar to the Magma Size master but with solenoid powered bullet feeder bar.
Probably go to a 1kW motor 2880rpm and an MNRV 050 at 20 to 1. feeder will be a Mr Bulletfeeder pro. larger and faster to feed this sizer.

[Jatz357]

One of mine runs .37kw motor about 1400 rpm and MNRV 040 10:1 and the other is .75kw and MNRV 050 10:1. Both worm drives are just generic brand. Check the specs of the worm drive you are going to use because most I researched had a max input speed of around 1450 - 1500 rpm

[Tazza]

Here are piccies of the motor and reduction box i'm running.





1350 RPM at 50 hertz with a reduction box of 28:1 run with a VFD. It has no issues sizing any 9mm projectile i throw at it. It doesn't love 158SWC though, i think the mould is a bit large, but i can live with that, my feeder doesn't like them either, so most of them are sized by hand, i don't do a whole lot of them so that's not a big deal.

[Jatz357]

Higher ratio drive will boost smaller motor torque. At 10:1 I had to reduce the stroke length to short as possible to help with torque. Next sizer will definitely have a higher ratio worm drive.

Anyway the use of Hi-Tek Aqualube helps quite a lot. Very slippery stuff.

[Tazza]

Mine has a pretty short stroke to assist in giving more pushing power. I tried to time it so it was closer to the end if stroke when pushing the bearing surface of the projectile through the die to get as much leverage as possible.

[Gremlin460]

Taking a old Lee 6cav ali mold a guy brought to me a few years ago to try and fix. A 23/64th drill bit, a 6mm bull-nose end mill and a leap of faith..

I now have a fully functional LSWC 6 cav mold that dropped casts @ 152g to start with. I chucked it back in the 4 jaw on the lathe and skimmed the face and now it drops 148g .

Took a few hours to linish/polish out to 358.5 dia and wihile its not a world class finish , it works suprisingly well and sizes nicely to 358.

Going to poke a few over the Crony tommorow and see what it returns in data.

So Taz, if I can do it with the little tools I have, you can too.

Mike.

[Ausglock]

photos???????